The Northern Light

Issue date: 9/19/06 Section: News

Receiving an F can be devastating for a college student. But what happens when the college itself receives failing grades?

The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education recently released "Measuring Up 2006: The National Report Card on Higher Education." The report gives grades reflecting how a state's higher-education system stacks up nationally in six categories: preparation, participation, affordability, completion, benefits and learning. Alaska received two F's in affordability and completion and has only shown improvement in two categories since 1992: preparation and completion. The report grades all higher-education institutions and is not specific to UAA.

Measuring Up states that Alaska has made "no notable progress in making higher education affordable." The report measures affordability by whether students and their families can pay for higher education, given income levels, financial aid, and all types of colleges and universities in the state. Of note is Alaska's low investment toward need-based financial aid; Alaska invests only six percent of the available need-based aid money given to its student, each year. The other 93 percent is federally funded. Comparatively, top-ranked states had a reported 89 percent investment in need-based aid in the early 1990s.

Alaska also requires a high share of family income to pay for higher-level education. A public four-year university, such as UAA, on average requires 24 percent of a family's income compared to 16 percent in top performing states.

"It's an embarrassment," said Rep. Les Gara, D-Alaska. "Five years ago, back when tuition was lower and the state was scrapped for cash, we could get away with it. Now we can't get away with not having need-based financial aid."

Gara sponsored House Bill 340 earlier in 2006 in an effort to boost need-based financial assistance in the state. The bill would have implemented a two-percent income tax on oil revenue to fund higher-education needs. According to Gara's sponsor statement, an estimated $88 million would have been generated. The bill was not passed.

Gara plans to continue trying to get legislation that will improve the state's need-based financial aid and is tired of Alaska being ranked so poorly in this area. He also said that need-based financial aid is a matter of basic dignity and that higher-education options should be available to everyone.

"I wouldn't be where I am today without it," Gara said.

Mary Snyder, dean of UAA's College of Education, thought the report points out key areas that UAA needs to improve on.

Snyder said the report is indicative of the youthfulness of higher-education programs in Alaska. She said that of the four other institutions she has worked at in the past, all of them had lasted more than 100 years and had had more time to deal with these types of problems.

"But there is awareness here, and we are trying to address these issues," she said. "Whenever you give a letter grade to anything as massive and conceptual as some of these issues, it's going to boil down complex topics down to the lowest common denominator.

"In a way the grades aren't fair, but on the other hand they are good indicators of some of the things we need to work on," she said.

Snyder said the standards used in government reports like these can sometimes miss important information, such as various circumstances involving completion rates.

She thought that Alaska's 21-percent completion rating was not a reasonable assessment of UAA's actual success rate.

"I understand that they're using certain criteria for completion. But my understanding is if you go seven years out instead of six years out our completion rate increases significantly. Alaska is unique on how people get their college degrees," Snyder said. "Completion is probably very directly tied into tuition and affordability. I'd like to see more need-based scholarships available."

"K-12 education is under funded, and higher education could be funded at a substantially better rate too. People in Alaska really do want to see education succeed; it's important, so it needs to be funded appropriately," Snyder said.

University Provost Mike Driscoll said the methodology looks at the whole state, not just UAA, and that the report is not necessarily a precise indicator.

Driscoll said Alaska is unique and that at UAA it's hard to differentiate between the community college aspect and the university, something that could be hard to see in a government report.

"If a person takes one class for their job but isn't seeking a degree, that's not a bad thing," he said.

Driscoll thinks there is a bigger picture to take into account before jumping to conclusions or blaming the university.

"We need to work carefully with our school-district partners to prepare students. There are a lot of developmental courses to help students be ready for college," Driscoll said.

Driscoll thinks that assessing what students know before they begin classes is something that can help with completion of higher education.

"If a student walks into English 111 without the skills for it, they are set up to fail. That can be devastating to a student's college career," Driscoll said.

Retaining students is a priority for UAA, but it's not as simple as making sure a student completes more than one year.

"It's not about just getting second-year students back, but it's about having a successful second year."

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